


when my bruises align with yours

by TheKitteh



Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: A pinch of hurt and comfort, Avengers Family, Canon Divergence - Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), Domestic, Domestic Avengers, Established Relationship, Fluff, Getting Together, M/M, Multi, Natasha Is a Good Bro, Natasha's and Tony's friendship, Oblivious Tony, Pining, Polyamory, Polyamory Negotiations, Romance, Sam Wilson is So Done, Steve Rogers Is So Done, Tony Feels, Tony POV, Well-adjusted Bucky, all the softness for the boys, disaster Clint, so soft, soft
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-01
Updated: 2019-05-01
Packaged: 2020-02-10 12:53:17
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18660826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheKitteh/pseuds/TheKitteh
Summary: The one where Tony's a pining idiot, Clint is your usual disaster, Bucky's the one who has his shit together and Natasha is the best kind of friend anyone can ask for.--Tony Stark Bingo square: T4 “Tony and Clint”WinterIron Bingo square: O1 “domestic”Bucky Barnes Bingo square: B1 “polyamory/open relationship”





	when my bruises align with yours

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rudearrow](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rudearrow/gifts).



> Happy Birthday to my lovely Ru! This one's for you love, thank you for being a constant source of inspiration in both fandom and real life!
> 
> That said, this is my very first attempt at anything poly-related, so bear with me, y'all and enjoy the ride! 
> 
> As always a HUGE shout out to Lys without who this would be a mumbo-jumbo mess of grammar and a bonus one to Misty, without whom this wouldn't even begin <3

Tony was going to die by an assassin's hand, he was sure of it.

 

Well, maybe not “hand” per se, and not really directly, but still, an assassin or two - two, actually - would be the imminent cause of his death.

 

And funnily enough, Natasha is hardly part of this setup.

 

He does blame her though. Blames her _hard._

 

She waltzed straight into his life, after all, Clint right there at her back. And vouched for Bucky, when Steve brought him in.

 

Tony should’ve known that the famed Black Widow would be his undoing, but frankly, he never thought it would be like this.

 

_\---_

 

He probably would deal with it better if it was only one of them.

 

Bucky or Clint.  


Clint or Bucky.

 

Tony’s had experience with this, after all, and it would hardly be the first time.

 

But no. That would be too easy. This time, it was both of them.

 

_\---_

 

It was Clint fucking Barton.

 

With his broken history of mistreatment and abuse, with his clumsiness that stood in stark (hah!) contrast to his amazing skills. With his always sleepy smiles and tiredly drooping eyes, with fingers tinted with something Tony _hoped_ was ink.

 

It was James fucking Bucky Barnes.

 

With more pain and traumatic experience under his belt than anyone alive and who still managed to be kind and good. Who could kill you with a glare and still lay a gentle hand - metal or flesh, it didn’t matter, the gentleness was there - on one’s shoulder.

 

They both went through so much and came out winning.

 

How could Tony not fall in love with either of them…? With both of them?

 

_\---_

 

The first moment Tony realizes might be ear-deep in shit is when a message from Clint gets transferred directly to him.

 

Apparently, Clint needs his assistance.

 

Which, well. Is surprising, cause Clint would much rather sleep his days away than do anything requiring assistance and even if he needed it, Tony isn’t sure he’s on the “call to” list.

 

Well, Clint sure proved him wrong, asking Fri to pass on the message.

 

And this is how Tony finds himself in Clint’s room, hand over his face at the sight of the utter and complete disaster. There are cables _everywhere_ , more than Tony thought actually were in fact in Clint’s room and walls, and the man himself is in the middle of it all, looking up at Tony with bright eyes.

 

“I might be a little bit in over my head here,” he admits after a moment of silence, utterly sheepish and Tony’s heart _lurches_ in his chest all of the sudden.  

 

Clint looks nothing like the deadly assassin he is; he looks like a tired, lost boy, with the tip of his nose scratched and a cut on his lower lip. Still healing from the last call to assemble, where he bore the brunt of a miscalculation on Tony’s own end. His guilt is enough to drop everything like a hot potato 

 

Well, that and the fact that there’s a, - certain charm to the archer.

 

There’s something that draws Tony in, makes it impossible to ignore Clint’s presence when he plops barefooted into the kitchen in the middle of the night and eats leftover pizza from the fridge.

 

He’s quirky, he’s fun, he’s an absolute disaster of a human and Tony can’t really stop smiling whenever Clint’s around, he’s a hot shot during missions and a trusty companion to watch Tony’s back.

 

Tony toes off his shoes and then socks, goes to untangle the mess Clint and the cables have somehow become.

 

They end up eating the leftover pizza and drinking lukewarm beer on the floor, reruns of Golden Girls on the TV. It’s nice in a way Tony’s not used to. They’re sharing quiet laughs and napkins, talking about their love for Betty White.  Clint’s a soft, warm presence next to Tony and everything feels hazy, fuzzy; like time slowed down between them and it crawls through each minute like a stampede of tortoises crawls through molases.

 

The nap like that, on the floor in front of Clint’s couch, Tony’s head on Clint’s shoulder and their bare feet touching.

 

Really, it should be the first and only clue Tony needed.

 

\---

 

The moment Tony really should acknowledge that he _is_ in fact in deep shit is when Bucky comes down to the workshop for arm maintenance.

 

In Tony’s defence, it’s nothing unusual.

 

The arm sustains a fair portion of damage during the missions, despite being the top of the art tech Tony prides himself on delivering. But there’s always something to fix afterward, be it a bent panel or a twisted finger joint.  Bucky’s pain threshold is something to be horrified by - Tony refuses to be awestruck, knowing how he came to handle pain like that - so Tony’s always quick to fix whatever malfunction there is.

 

He doesn’t like any of his friends in pain and Bucky’s one of the most frequent visitors in his ‘shop.

 

So he thinks nothing off the slightly awkward high-five Bucky shares with Dum-E or the soft pat he gives U. Or the way he jokes and teases Friday, cranking up that 40’s charm on the AI to both her and Tony’s utter delight.

 

Thinks nothing of the fact that Bucky slides into his chair with ease and comfort or that he has a chair to begin with, or that he’s got a thermo-cup with him that he hands over to Tony without hesitation.

 

“Really did a number on it this time, didn’t ya, Buck-a-boo?” Tony clicks his tongue, sliding the magnifying glasses on as he gently opens the panels in Bucky’s wrist. They’re dented at an odd angle, the edges wavy.

 

“Ehn,” Bucky shrugs his right shoulder, eyes bright under the artificial lighting. He’s smiling that funny soft smile of his,  so Tony thinks - hopes - the pain isn’t too much to handle right now. “Worth it.”

 

Tony has a feeling there’s something deliberately left out at the moment, but if Bucky doesn’t want to share how exactly he got hurt, that’s Bucky’s choice.

  
The man’s entitled to as many of them as he wants.

 

“Ok. You tell me if it hurts, ok?” He picks up the tweezers, starts to separate the wirings to check if anything inside got fried in the scuffle.

 

Bucky talks to him the whole time. Asks about every project Tony’s got going on or how his day went. Asks about the bruised ribs and how are they healing. Asks about weekend plans and if it’s ok to hold a Game of Thrones marathon for the whole team.

 

Tony’s smiling the whole time and doesn’t even question the fact that Bucky stays after the repairs are done.

 

\---

 

Of course, the moment when he’s literally faced with the hard truth is when he stumbles into the kitchen at crack o’ dawn after thirty hours of working on Steve’s uniform upgrades.

 

He mumbles hello to them both, powers on through towards the coffee machine and only then realizes his greeting fell flat because Bucky and Clint are busy kissing the living daylight out of each other.

 

Tony bolts out of the kitchen, nursing a hot coffee and a sudden flare of pain in his heart.

 

\---

 

He feels excused to hide in the workshop for the next two days, until Natasha comes and drags him out by the ear. She berates him quietly throughout the whole duration of the ride up, helps him undress and change into a clean t-shirt and sweats.

 

Then she curls up in Tony’s bed with him, fingers butterfly gentle in his hair; her heartbeat a steady, grounding sound in his ear as she tries to soothe his aches.

 

“Breathe, Tony,” she mutters whenever he forgets, which is way too often. “Breathe.”

 

\---

 

He throws all the pieces of his broken heart into his work.

 

Tony comes up with some of his most brilliant solutions for their gear.

 

Pepper isn’t too difficult to convince to broaden the R&D Department with medical engineering and prosthetics. Her smile is sad and  knowing, however, when she mentions a supply run from Wakanda or when she reads the newest projects that got approved in the hearing aid niche.

 

She simply kisses Tony’s cheek when he storms in, a maniacal grin on his lips and the tiniest, most compact arc reactor in his hand.

 

Clint’s face when he gets the very first pair and learns he never has to charge them again is worth everything. The hug he drags Tony into, well, it sort of makes breathing hard.

 

When the new arm for Bucky is fully developed and processed, the reactor’s bright blue  glow seeping through the panels when Bucky rotates his wrist in amazement, slowly clenches and unclenches his fingers, Tony smiles at the wonder in his face.  

 

He keeps on smiling even when Bucky wraps that arm around Clint’s waist.

 

\---

 

He’s fairly sure Steve wants him dead.

 

There is no other explanation as to why all of the sudden every roster rotation has Tony teamed up with either Clint, Bucky, or both of them.  

 

And… ok, he gets it in a way. Knowingly or not, Tony works so damn well with both of them - they’ve got both aerial and long distance covered this way, and on the rare occasions where the three of them are teamed up, they’re close to invincible.

 

But that means that Tony’s exposed to the way they are on the battlefield and that’s, - that’s all sorts of mind-blowing, really. Because Tony’s sort of used to seeing them all soft around each other, sickeningly cute with Bucky’s nose nuzzles and Clint’s burrowing. They’re so endlessly gentle when they’re curled up on the sofa together, always touching one way or another.

 

And out there, during a fight? They’re lethal.

 

Clint’s all deadly precision and breathtaking agility, Bucky’s all raw strength and aim.

 

They cause Tony’s brain to sizzle whenever they fight together and it’s a miracle he hasn’t steered himself into a building whenever Clint takes out three enemies at once or Bucky stops a car with one hand.

 

It’s going to happen soon though, Tony fears, because they’re distracting as hell and he just … doesn’t know how long he can do this.

 

When he brings up the odd team-ups, Steve just gives him the flattest look - and oh wow, the newspapers would pay through the nose to get a picture of Cap looking like that - and tells him to figure it out on his own.

 

Tony kind of wants to hate him then, but later that night Steve makes salt caramel popcorn and he figures he might forgive him a little bit.  Even if he’s late to the movie and the only place left to sit is next to the lovey-dovey assassin couple.

 

Clint ends up taking the whole space, drooling onto Bucky’s shirt and with his feet in Tony’s lap.

 

Tony has no recollection what movie they were watching that evening.

 

\---

 

“You’re an idiot,” Natasha croons sweetly, fingers scratching at his scalp one evening.

 

She’s his saving grace in all of this, somehow always knowing when he needs a distraction and a reminder to come up for air.

 

Bucky’s spent half a day in his workshop, doing nothing really except playing with the bots and reading a book, leaving only to bring snacks and coffee for both himself and Tony.

 

It’s safe to say Tony’s brain has melted through the soles of his feet by the time Bucky leaves, saying goodbye to Dum-E and promising to visit soon and bring a new ball.

 

Fucking hell, he never had a chance.

 

“I’m sure many would agree,” Tony finally mutters into her thigh and closes his eyes.

 

It’s all still her fault, he thinks.

 

\---

 

Tony looks up from the StarkPad just in time to see Clint drag himself into the common room. He looks the usual - bare feet coming out from under old jeans that ride low on his hips, an old and tattered t-shirt and a crow’s nest of hair. He looks like the epitome of a beautiful disaster and Tony _aches_.

 

The need to wrap himself around Clint is almost impossible to overcome, to hold him and to run fingers through the blond strands, put them into place and ruffle them the next second. He wants, so bad, and for one terrible moment, Tony thinks he’s going to do it and ruin it all.

 

Somehow he doesn’t. He plasters on a megawatt smile, instead.

 

“Fancy seeing you here, Robin Hood. What’s up?”

 

Clint rubs at his eyes - a gesture so innocent it makes Tony die a little inside - and then he focuses on Tony himself. It’s always a heady feeling, to have the archer’s attention on him like that and for a fraction of a second, Tony feels like he’s the whole of his world.

 

It’s a heady feeling and a dangerous one, because he and Clint, they’re, - well, not like that.

 

The feeling is gone the second Clint blinks and moves.

 

He’s obviously going for a nap on the couch if the whole narcoleptic look he has going on is anything for Tony to go by, so he drops the Pad to the coffee table, untangles his feet from the blanket, -

 

And ends up pushed back into to couch, Clint’s warm, warm weight pinning him down as he literally plasters himself all over Tony’s front.

 

The noise Tony makes is a _hnnngh_ and a _adkghaj_ , but it doesn’t get a chance to change into anything more because Clint fucking Barton makes one last valiant effort, pushes himself up onto his elbows and presses a clumsy, stale coffee tasting kiss to Tony’s mouth.

 

This has to be what a blue screen feels like, Tony’s sure of it. Or the brain equivalent of one.

 

Oh dear god and all saints.

 

“You’re so stupid sometimes,” Clint murmurs against his lips, eyes deliciously hazy as he boops his nose onto Tony’s cheek a second later. “I’ma sleep now.”

 

He tucks himself in, face pressed into Tony’s neck and true to his word, he’s making small sleepy sounds the very next moment.

 

While Tony’s left to go through an equivalent of a heart attack (he’s got enough experience to compare this to, thank you) or maybe a small earthquake.

 

“What the fuck?” he whispers towards the ceiling, voice edging towards hysterics. “What the _fuck?_ ”

 

Oh, oh, oh, no, this is … this is so bad, so so bad, epically bad. Because where Clint is Bucky soon follows and well this looks the way it looks like and Tony supposes the explanation of “ _he just laid on me to sleep_ ” - while absolutely true - might not be the best one out there.

 

Then again this would require actually _moving_ Clint off of him. And while there is a certain allure to being trapped under all of this sleeping, warm weight, this is still something Tony should be actively avoiding.

 

He’s well on his way to full blown panic when he registers that Bucky is in fact present. He’s leaning against the doorframe, his shoulders are shaking in what can only be laughter and the look on his face is all sorts of impossible.

 

Because Bucky looks _happy_.

 

Tony’s reduced to playing a full body pillow to Bucky’s boyfriend and Bucky looks like he’s the cat who got the cream and the canary too.

 

“Uh… hi?” He tries and Bucky moves then.

 

If Tony’s brain wasn’t still trying to reboot itself, it would sizzle out again at the sight of that strut, because how unfair it is that even Bucky’s trademark murder strut is so damn attractive?

 

“Hey yourself. So,- I told him you might need a more subtle approach.” It’s almost impossible, but Bucky’s smile becomes both wider and softer. “Though if you haven’t figured it out by now, I think subtlety might be lost on you.”

 

Oh god, this is all Loki’s doing, Tony’s sure of it because that can’t be Bucky’s hand brushing some hair off of Tony’s forehead so damn lovingly.

 

Or maybe he drank one of Dum-E’s smoothies unknowingly?

 

“I- you- what?” Certified genius his ass.

 

Not very much of a playboy either, Tony manages to think, trying his damnedest not to get too distracted by the bright, happy twinkle of Bucky’s eyes.

 

It’s a lost battle, but let it not be said Tony Stark didn’t try.

 

“Tony,” Bucky smiles and Tony’s heart does something funny like a flip-and-stop-beating, because this is the stuff rom-coms are made of but Tony’s life is hardly one, more of some sort of dark comedy really,-

 

“Damn it, Tasha’s gonna be unbearable!” Sam’s voice is a loud and unwelcome interruption and, judging by the clenching of Bucky’s jaw, Tony’s not the only one who thinks that. “Does this mean you guys are done tiptoeing around each other now? ‘Cause I gotta say, the UST was beginning to be suffocating and if I have to listen to one more ode to Tony’s ass, I’m resigning.”

 

Bucky groans rubs a hand over his face before he takes a seat next to Tony, at the foot of the sofa. He seems hesitant for a second before he takes a deep breath and takes Tony’s hand into his, as well.

 

Sam makes a gagging noise and leaves with a “ _yeah, no, I’m not watching this._ ”

 

Bucky’s hand is dry and warm and, -

 

“So, uh.” Tony clears his throat and gives him a light squeeze, trying to decide if this is real or not.  “I think I’m missing some vital information here, Sub-Zero. Don’t get me wrong, this is nice and all,” he makes a gesture with his chin at Clint, “but what the fuck?”

 

Bucky grins, presses a kiss to Tony’s knuckles.

 

And that’s another blue screen right there.

 

“How about we let sleeping princess here sleep for a while and we’ll talk once he regains enough human abilities?” he murmurs quietly, fondly. “We’ll take you out for dinner? Away from our nosey teammates?”

 

Something that feels like hope lights up inside of Tony's heart. “Wine and dine?”

 

“Sorta. Some woo, too?” Bucky makes himself comfortable with his back to the couch, drapes Tony’s arm around himself as he holds his hand over his heart. “If, - if you’re ok with this. Us.”

 

“Us? You and him?” Tony feels too warm all over and only one percent of that has to do anything with Clint’s quietly snoring body.  Bucky’s eyes are pretty up so close and if this is a dream, Tony’s gonna be pissed. “I’m... yeah, I’m ok.”

 

He gets another kiss over his knuckles - and oh good god, how lucky he is he’s laying down, he’d be swooning like a 40s dame - and Bucky settles in for the wait.

 

It’s all nice and warm and Tony feels safe, his eyes becoming heavier and heavier with each passing minute. Maybe he could nap as well - if anything, Friday will wake them all up when the time for dinner comes.

 

A sudden thought makes him blink.

 

“Odes to my ass? Really?”

 

Bucky’s eyes are closed, head tilted back but he replies without missing a beat.

 

“Sweet thing, your ass could break all of HYDRA’s conditioning all on its' own, now shut up and go to sleep.”

 

Before Tony does just that, he makes one more mental note.

 

Tasha’s room gets decked out with thousands of baby’s breaths the next day.


End file.
